i wonder what it was like to live in time of the old Crusades. what were relations between israel the surrounding area? were there even jews in palestine?

i don't really have a good grasp on history. sometimes, when i am in the right mood, i will do a little independent studying on the internet. and really, that's a lot more than i ever did for a history class. fuck, that's more than i ever did for just about any class. nonetheless, i don't have a good grasp on history.

the first class i ever failed was a history class. of course, it was in my drug-laden sophomore year of high-school. but my freshmen year, i got a d in history. so ... yeah. either way, i don't know anything about the crusades. i just might go and read about them in a few minutes, but who really knows ... it's getting kind of late.

i am pretty sure that i am living during the crusades right now. people are so quick to say that this is not a war on islam or one on behalf of christianity, and i can't really argue against that. in my history of the middle east class (failed, fyi), i tried to argue that the war was clearly a religious venture, citing speaches made by george bush.

but the problem is that in order to assume that bush is leading a crusade, you have to first give him enough credit to do such a thing. i kind of figure that bush is a decent man. in fact, here is a list of attributes that i assign the man ... without ever having met him:

• slightly ignorant, as in not "book smart"
• funny and upbeat
• honoring god, his wife, his family, his state and his country -- in that order
• stubborn and vengeful
• loyal
• open-hearted and close-minded

and looking at him in that light, i do think he is capable of leading the crusades without really having what it takes to lead a war. and really, that's because he has surrounded himself with people that you would think would be capable of leading a war. but i am certainly having my doubts. i think that if we were not capable of taking the entire arabian peninsula, we should not have invaded iraq. i can't find the rationale. it's almost like they thought they could ride in and wipe iraq away and use the uncountable loot to fund the rest of the war.

maybe the problem is that it has been so long since the united states tried to take over someone. i don't really know. but i do know that i am really not impressed with this American war machine either. i am not saying that they are as bad as al qaeda (why can't i spell that stupid word?), but just not impressive. how would we ever fight china? fuck, how would we even fight a unified islamist front?

really, thank god this isn't the crusades. because if these people had any muscle or unity, our military would have been descimated. that's how much we suck right now. oh shit, i think i got off on a tangent.

so when i would argue that the motivation for the current situation in the middle east (american wars + palestinian conflict) was religion, my teacher -- a brilliant woman -- offered insurmoutable evidence that this war had largely geo-Political motives, including the securing of oil reserves but more based on access to water.

but i have never been able to shake this feeling that we are in the crusades, and this war has little sanity to its motivations ... and that americans do not seem to care.

i am pretty sure that if the congress wanted the war to end, it would end. and the motivation behind any freely elected republican legislature is re-election. thus, if the people wanted the war to end, then so would the congress.

but no, people are caught up in stupid politcal bullshit. you would be suprised at how many republicans (clearly liberals, if not fascists) are calling themselves conservatives because they are right-wing and how many democrats (who are nothing left of moderates) are calling themselves liberals because they support machiavellian social programs. meanings of political aproaches mean nothing any more.

there once was a day when conservatives didn't believe that the Government should be in your bedroom. there was a time when a leftist would argue on behalf of the poor, asking for a greater distribution of wealth and more strides to lift up the ass end of the bus to that future.

seriously, what the fuck are we exporting? how could we even think that someone would be interested in this brand of "democracy"? there is no free exchange of ideas. in this modern age, how can you expect to even have a discussion without representing the views of the greatest political thinker in the last 200 years?

i would like to see the day when america matters again in the formation of a modern government. our fucking puppet regimes are more modern than us. i want a socialist to win a seat in congress. really, i want more political parties. it would be nice if we had as many political parties as we do political viewpoints. that would be a democracy i could be proud of.

as it is now, i am embarrassed on behalf of my government. it seems retarded to tell the rest of the world that you know the structure of a perfect government when we are still living behind a constitution that was written before there was electricity, cars, trains, light, computers, atomic bombs, flight, revolvers, cameras, etc.

long story short, israel attacked palestine yet again today ... with american built attack helicopters. i am also confused why we continue to support israel. eventually you have to put your foot down ... right? they already have me worried with the weapons we have given them. i am convinced the end of the israeli dagger is less than an inch away from the kidneys of the american effort to secure arabia. and of course, the first crusades pitted christians against jews.

i guess this is all just further proof that i don't really know anything.